


Tricks and Treats

by Landi_Elliot



Series: October Tales [7]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Apples, Drawing, Drinking & Talking, Friendship, Gen, Halloween, Metafiction, Pumpkins, Writers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:28:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22227151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Landi_Elliot/pseuds/Landi_Elliot
Summary: The Angel and Demon Writing Army have finished their project by Halloween and now they are celebrating.
Series: October Tales [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1544227
Comments: 5





	Tricks and Treats

It is already dark when Joseph and Audrey reach Iris’s house. The wind is howling and the outlines of trees in the garden have an ominous feeling about them. The house looks dark apart from a carved pumpkin in one of the windows.

“Do you think it is going to be a dark and stormy night then?” Audrey asks Joseph with a smirk.

“I sure hope so,” he replies and rings the bell.

Iris opens the door almost immediately: she must have heard the car, Audrey thinks. Iris is wearing a flowing white gown and holding a lantern.

“Trick or treat,” Audrey says happily.

“Oh no,” Iris exclaimed. “I can never choose! I always want both… I mean, I want to give treats to people but I love their tricks as well.”

“Then it’s your lucky day, ang… What are you wearing exactly? Didn’t you imply that you were going to cosplay Aziraphale?” Audrey says. She herself is wearing an outfit very loosely based on Crowley’s, but still quite recognizable as an ensemble. She didn’t renew her tattoo, though. She said (when Iris asked her about it a couple of days ago) that after hosting the demon for those precious few minutes in the escape room she has the serpent under her skin and doesn’t need the outer proof of it anymore.

“Well, I am cosplaying him, actually.”

“Oh my god, so you are!” Audrey yells as she realizes that the flowing gown imitated the one Aziraphale wore on the wall around the Garden of Eden.

“What did you do to the flaming sword that was given unto thee?” Joseph asks pointing to the lantern.

“Gave it a new home.” Iris replies. “Come on in, you two jokers.”

“Tricksters, at your service,” Joseph says and in they go.

The pumpkin, on closer inspection, turns out to have a set of a devil’s wings and horns on one side and an angel’s wings and a halo on the other.

“It works better when it’s placed next to the wall, look!” Iris moves the pumpkin to the wall and turns off the light. The halo side is facing them – but the shadow on the wall is that of a devil. Then she turns it around and the vision reverses. It is a devil with angel wings and a halo now.

“That’s deep, hun,” Audrey whispers mesmerized by the pumpkin.

“Conceptual,” Joseph adds. “You should be an artist.”

They just stand there for while, gazing at the pumpkin. Dark and stormy this night might be, Audrey thinks, but it is still all about coziness in Iris’s house. Even her conceptuality is soothing. How does she do it?

“So, trick or treat time?” Iris said, breaking the pumpkin-gazing silence.

*

It turns out that Audrey’s trick is a bit of treat because it is a sack of apples, big, red and crisp ones.

“For some _apple trouble_ ”, she explains enigmatically.

“I am not doing apple bobbing,” Joseph says sternly. “I have standards. And a beard.”

“Not apple bobbing, relax, Cap,” Audrey says with a wicked smile. “I have something much worse in mind.”

It also turns out that Iris’s treat was a bit of a trick because it is some freshly cooked devilled eggs with such amount of Tabasco that Audrey gets tears in her eyes after biting into one. Joseph, on the other hand, says she should have used even more pepper for the eggs to be properly devilled.

“There’s just no pleasing some people,” Iris sighs.

Joseph’s trick-and-treat is the wine which he promptly uncorks. But Audrey says they have to do something before the booze time. She produces three small knives from her pocket.

“That doesn’t bode well,” Iris laughs.

“Yes, that bodes trouble, just as I said.” Audrey replies. “So, this is what you do. Take one of these and carve something like _To the most beautiful_ on the apple. Only with regard to our stories.”

“Apples of discord! _That_ kind of trouble,” Joseph exclaims.

“Exactly.”

“And why would you want to sow discord among us, dear fellow author?”

“Because I am a demon, remember? What is a demon supposed to do on Halloween, sing you a spooky carol? But, of course, if you prefer apple bobbing…”

“No, no, discord is fine by me! And my beard. I’ll take this one then.”

They all pick an apple and get to work. Soon there are three inscriptions on the apples and Audrey mixes them with the rest in the sack. After some more devilled eggs and more tears they finally get to the bottle of wine, toast the finale of their writing project and in no time at all end up on the same carpet where it all began. Audrey wishes she also had a loose gown on rather than tight trousers. Perhaps next time.

“Well, Angel and Demon Writing Army, confession time,” says the Captain. “How was it?”

“Tough!”

“Mind-boggling!”

“Frustrating!”

“Crazy!”

“So, was it worth the effort then?”

“Totally!”

“Thought so,” Captain nods. “Loved it myself. Every frustrating moment of it.”

“I mean,” Audrey begins, “The frustrating bit is that whatever idea you come up with, thinking, like, this is so original and spicy, you only have to hit the tags and there you have it – it’s been done.”

“Ten times over,” Iris adds.

“So this is why it was taking you two so long? You were looking for _original ideas_? I never bothered to check whether my idea had been done or not. I just went for it.”

“Well, good for you, Captain. We’ll partake of your wisdom next time we succumb to the temptation. Speaking of which…”

She reaches into the sack and pulls out an apple. It has nothing on it. She bites into it, saying rather indistinctly:

“Go on, Sergeant Angel Cake, you try.”

Iris takes the sack from Audrey and puts her hand inside. For a while she is relishing the smoothness of the apples against her fingertips. She soon feels some carved letters on one of the apples and pulls it out.

“It says,” she starts. “Hmm… I think it says _To the craziest_. Well, what do I do with it?”

“Give it to the craziest author among us, obviously.”

“Can I keep it?” Iris asks tentatively.

“I see your point,” says Joseph. “What you’ve written is pretty crazy, especially the Stonehenge bit, but…”

“Oh, that reminds me!” Audrey interrupts him. “I’ve been binging _The Good Place_ – it’s a sort of a Good Omens spin-off for me – and suddenly there’s this magic elephant who knows the answers to all the questions in universe. And, out of nowhere, he just says this thing about Stonehenge – “it’s a sex thing”! I’d only read that chapter – I nearly fell of the chair.”

“You see, Sergeant Angel Cake, I was just gonna say. The craziest author among us is definitely Sergeant Tattoo. She’s just proved the point. She quotes magic elephants.”

“She’s crazy, to be sure,” Iris concedes and immediately gets a look of reproach from Audrey. “But we are talking _literature_ here. It’s the text we are putting on the scale, not the author.”

“I second that!” Audrey interjects.

“Therefore, the _To the craziest_ award must surely go to… you, Captain. The idea of seducing an angel by means of a sex shop is crazy enough by itself, but paired with the angel in question exploring this Garden of Earthly Delights, subjecting the demon to ineffable torment…”

“…including the bit about sex with God via the Internet, don’t forget that!” Audrey intervenes.

“Yes, there was that. To say nothing of the fact that all of this served the purpose of advocating _asexuality_. Raving mad. I hereby give the award to Captain Dragon Scaramouche, the craziest author in the Army.”

“Thank you so much,” Joseph says laughing. “I am touched. And honoured. But let me just say this…”

“Yes, the winner’s speech!”

“The speech, the speech!”

Joseph sips some wine, coughs and starts again, holding the apple in his hand.

“I, of course, thank my parents, as well as school teachers who never talked about sex, for which I am eternally grateful. They also contributed a lot to my transformation into a complete nutter. But, to all those sexual and asexual readers alike, let me just say this. I am not advocating asexuality. I am advocating the crazy little thing called empathy – trying to see and feel things that others feel. Stop projecting your own desires onto others. Stop assuming they want what you want. That is what my Crowley lacks in the beginning and gains in the end. So… to empathy. Crazy, I know, in our narcissistic times. As I said, an utter nutter, me.”

“Oh Jos,” Iris whispers.

“Well, that was inspired.” Audrey says. “Will you do the honours of finding the next apple of discord… I mean award, Captain?”

Joseph makes quite a show of rummaging in the apples before he pulls out one and demonstrates it to the others. It says, quite distinctly, _to the sexiest_.

“A demon’s work, no doubt,” Joseph comments. “Shall I keep this one as well? Did you enjoy the creativeness of my smut?”

“We did!” Iris and Audrey shout.

“Thought so. But, that said, I admit I don’t deserve this award because I didn’t describe any actual sex happening. For obvious reasons. You two, on the other hand, daring authors that you are, stepped on this thin ice. How was it?”

“Harder than I thought,” Audrey confesses. And then adds with a sigh. “I thought I could do smut. Damn it, I thought I could do porn if I wanted to. But when I got down to it, the ice seemed much thinner and more dangerous than I had imagined it to be. So I kinda… tiptoed on it and got to the other side as fast as I could. So, the apple should go to Sergeant Angel Cake, no question. You did surprise me, hun.”

“I surprised myself,” Iris says candidly. “For me it was the other way round: I thought I couldn’t, but it turned out I could. I had to google things, of course…

“Yeah? Like what?”

“Like gay sex positions, if you must know. But generally, I discovered that, although I can write sex, I don’t really need to. I mean, it’s not the point – even though my story sort of depended on it. I guess I figured what it was that had been bothering me about sex. It’s not like biorhythms or whatever that do not coincide. It’s more… you know, like you eat, you get full and are still dissatisfied? Because you were not eating what you wanted but you also didn’t know what it was you wanted? The same with sex: you want something and you’re too lazy or confused to figure out what it is, so you think you want sex, by default, because isn’t it what you’re supposed to want when you’re drawn to someone? Gods, I’m incoherent and the analogy is lame…”

“On the contrary, it makes perfect sense to me,” Audrey says, “Food and sex, that’s where we started and that’s where it ends. So here you are. To the sexiest author. And that stream-of-consciousness counts as your speech. Unless you want to make another, of course.”

“No, I’m good,” Iris smiles. “But thanks to you two, of course. Never thought I had it in me.”

“Neither did I.”

“Nor I.” Joseph adds. “Makes you wonder what else is in there, eh?”

“Perchance we’ll discover some more,” Audrey says, “But listen, Sergeant, about your story. Did they _really_ have it all so smoothly every time? Ok, there were only 6 of those, but still. I was sort of half-expecting… for the want of a better word… a fuck-up.”

“Yes, there always has to be a fuck-up!” Joseph cries. “It’s the law!”

Iris sighs and shifts on the carpet a bit.

“Well, all right, let’s leave aside the obvious factor that they are _not_ human and are simply more in control of their corporations. We know for a fact that they are capable of fuck-ups, so why not sexual ones as well.”

“Yeah, so why not? Was Aziraphale not totally honest with his therapist?”

“Or with the reader?”

“He was as honest as he could be,” Iris says. “And if I am angelically honest too, I must confess that I wanted to give them a couple of fuck-ups – one in the 14th century’s England and another in the 20th century Europe, in the 1940s. But… but I just didn’t want to penetrate any of those times and places. So I did my share of tiptoeing and sidestepping, I guess. Anyway, what’s the last apple of discord? Shall I get it?”

“Ok, if you insist.” Audrey says. “But I’ll still imagine their fuck-ups – there’s something comforting about the thought.”

Iris sighs again and fishes the last apple out of the sack. She looks at it and frowns.

“Hey, that’s not very legible. To the most… pe… pensive? No, wait, this one is definitely a _t_. _Penetrative_! Oh.”

“Oh indeed. Then you should have this one as well,” Audrey says. “I mean… not just time and space, but also that anchor thing. That really got to me. And memory.”

“Same here,” Joseph concurs. “Sometimes you don’t know how to handle all those memories you have – and now think of millennia full of memories!”

“And I am very happy it all resonates with you guys, but listen. This one should go to Sergeant Tattoo. Think about it. This brave author penetrates the nature of love in her story. And, although I’m sure I’ll never become polyamorous, I found it eyes-opening. I realized I could never get rid of the ownership idea. As well as control – when it comes to relationships. Couldn’t stop thinking about it. Still can’t.”

“I doubt anyone can get rid of that idea fully, hun. Too ingrained.” Audrey says softly. “Relationships are binding, by definition. Just as Jean says in your story, there’s never a couple with a power dynamic issue.”

“I suppose. But… let me try another lame analogy. Angels and demons are allegories, aren’t they? All right, don’t look at me like you’re going to discorporate me… all right, all right… _of course_ these particular two are real and all that, apparently living among us, inside us… all that jazz! But for the sake of the argument. Let’s pretend they are just personifications of good and evil and of this eternal struggle in us.”

“Good and evil power dynamic?”

“Precisely! So… bear with me. In Audrey’s story what they essentially boil down to is this: the angelic side is about wanting more love, while the demonic side is the fear of love; its negation. And the love itself is creative, inclusive, sharing. And the demonic negation is self-destructive.”

“I thought it was more of a self-defense mechanism,” Joseph says.

“That as well. Nothing is simple when it comes to love. Like elements – water, fire, the lot – it both gives life and kills.”

“Too much love will kill you,” Joseph sings.

“Just as too little…” Iris says firmly. “So here you are!”

She hands the apple over to Audrey who is lying there motionless, staring into the inner abyss.

“How… How did you _ever_ read all that out of my story? It was about Crowley feeling sleepy, that’s all. With a polyamorous twist. Honest!”

“Why don’t you give us a speech then?” Joseph says. “About what the author really meant? Not that it matters – it’s the readers who decide what the book is about, but sometimes it’s fun to listen to the author’s opinion.”

“To tell them where they got it wrong,” Iris adds.

“Okay, you asked for it!” Audrey rises on her elbow. “Somehow I can’t give a speech lying down. Oh-huh. On second thought, I probably can. So, fellow soldiers and authors, lend me your ears.”

Joseph and Iris cheer.

“The more I live in the world the less I know about love. It seems to consist entirely of complexities and nuances. So what I want to do is sleep.”

“Perchance to dream?”

“What dreams may come?”

“Yeah, yea, smart asses, you sure know your Shakespeare. Listen now. Call me escapist or whatever, but I am as far from penetrating anything complex as I can be. This is what writing a fic has taught me: it is fun, but not a solution. I just want to reduce the number of things I care about to the bare minimum and sleep just when things get out of hand. And yet…”

“I was waiting for this “and yet”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Here you have it then, prophets. And yet, as you sleep or hide or escape or perform any other maneuver in the name of self-defense, you come across that plant.”

“What plant?”

“Well, that bonsai plant in the escape room in my case, obviously. But it can be anything. The plant that plants the seed – that’s the point. You should pluck it out if you’re wise. Spot it, grab it, yank it out and go back to sleep. That’s what you should do.”

“But you don’t.”

“No. The irony of it. You know you’ll suffer and yet you relish the whole thing. You let it grow, you care about it, you yell at it, you hate it, you love. You get insomnia. You get headaches. You get wings.”

“What can I say?” Iris says after a long silence. “I placed the penetrative apple into the right hands.”

*

After a while Iris gets up to turn the pumpkin so that the angel faces them with the shadows of demonic wings dancing on the walls. Audrey cannot tear her eyes of her friend’s outline in the long gown.

“One question,” says Joseph, also getting up. “Did everyone get the apple they themselves carved or is it just me?”

“Me too”, Iris and Audrey say together.

“What do you think it means, soldiers?” Joseph demands, turning his head around as if searching for something.

“One of life’s little trick or treats, I suppose,” Audrey says.

“Well, something for us to meditate upon, tricksters, eh?” Joseph says. “Meanwhile, I’ve got some more tricky treats of my own. Almost forgot about them.”

He finally locates his bag and pulls out several sheets of paper. After intent staring at the light and shadows it takes Iris long to focus on what he hands to her. When she does focus, she gasps and cries out.

“Jos! These are amazing!”

“I should hope so. I dropped out of the Inktober challenge because of them.”

Audrey is already hugging him, and Iris joins in, carefully placing the illustrations on the carpet.

Joseph has done art for all three stories. Every picture has a frame with a black silhouette of the author leaning on it. The picture for his own story shows Aziraphale approaching the Devil’s Garden shop. Crowley’s face in the corner looks both funny and vulnerable. The illustration for “Brumation of the Soul” has the demon sitting on the top of the flight of stairs talking to the bonsai plant. The angel is also there, peeking from the half-opened door, sleepy and endearing in his tartan pajamas. The one for Iris’s story has a dark outline of Stonehenge with two winged creatures intertwined within it. The sky is bursting with stars.

“Not sure what it is they are doing inside there,” Joseph comments on the Stonehenge picture. “But it’s the way it is supposed be, innit? We’ll never really know what it is that angels and demons choose to do to each other to express the complexities and nuances of love.”

“You sound just like that mysterious commentator, what’s his name – As_Era_Failed,” Audrey observes. “I wonder who they really are”.

Iris is looking in awe at her own black silhouette on the picture, wondering who they all really were, in the garden of life’s little tricks and treats. And whether they’ll ever find out.

Well, whatever, she tells herself.

As long as they can take a walk in the garden and tell their own stories about it.

**Author's Note:**

> This chapter is written much later than the rest of October Tales. Initially, I tried to avoid writing it but then some of the readers pointed out that it was necessary for the sense of closure.  
> So closure it is then.


End file.
